Currently, Internet search engines index the information found on static web pages on public websites. Static web pages are web pages that exist before and after a user accesses them. A search engine saves two pieces of information from each static web page it indexes. The first piece of information is the location of the web page, commonly referred to as the uniform resource locator (URL). The second piece of information is one or more keywords from the text of the web page. A search engine is then, essentially, a collection of URLs and associated keywords.
Deep web information, however, is not contained on static web pages. Instead, it is produced in response to a specific query by a user and results in dynamic web pages. Search engines themselves are deep websites. A dynamic web page only exists after a user's query and disappears after the user exits the dynamic web page. As a result, deep web information or the dynamic web pages that can be generated from the deep web information are not typically available from search engines.
As a result, a user using a search engine to locate information, for certain type of information searching, often finds himself/herself not finding the right information, or having to re-enter the search criteria, as query parameters of queries to generate the dynamic web pages having the desired information.
FIGS. 8a-8d illustrate one example of this problem. For the illustrated example, a user uses a search service/engine (such as Goggle) to search for “Flights from Seattle to San Jose”. FIG. 8a illustrates selected portions of an example search answer web page returned from the search service/engine. An example search answer web page includes indices and indexing flight deals on Priceline and Orbitz's websites respectively, and indices and indexing static promotional pages on Southwest and Alaska Airline's websites respectively.
FIG. 8b illustrates the example static web page indexed by an index. It is essentially a form for facilitating a user to search for specific flight deals available on Priceline's website. In other words, because the flight deal web page for flights between Seattle and San Jose, if available, is dynamically generated based on flight deal information in a database, the proper query answer web page is not indexed by the search service/engine. Consequently it is not available. Only the generic static root web page (which could have been retrieved with merely the search criteria of “flight deals”) is indexed, resulting in the user essentially having to start the search over again, once he/she enters Priceline's website.
Similar disadvantages exist, if the Orbitz website is entered via an index.
FIGS. 8c-8d illustrate the static promotional web pages indexed by indices. They are merely promotional web pages, and not the flight schedule or availability web pages that the user is looking for. Again, the reason is that the flight schedule and availability web pages are dynamically generated based on the flight schedule and availability information in the databases of Southwest and Alaska Airlines.
FIGS. 9a-9b illustrate the end results that the user desires. That is, in response to the user's provision to a search engine, of the search criteria “flights between Seattle and San Jose”, the user is provided with a search answer page having indices that index not only the relevant static web pages, but also the relevant dynamic web pages to be generated, such as would be provided using this invention. Further, on selection of one of such indices, the user can be taken to the indexed dynamic web page, with the search criteria preserved, i.e. the from and to cities of Seattle and San Jose, filled in, without requiring the user to re-fill or re-select the search criteria again.